William Trubridge Takes the Gold at #VB2014

The last dive is complete, the Steinlager Pure has been cracked open, Suunto Vertical Blue 2014 is officially over and local hero William Trubridge has retained his title as champion of #VB2014. Winning the competition and taking the gold over Alexey Molchanov of Russia (who placed second) came at a very narrow margin but Trubridge delivered a resounding final blow when he came up not only strong & clean from a dive to 117m CWT but also very fast – ascending to the surface in just three minutes and :09 seconds. “I think this was one of the fastest dives I’ve ever done at that range,” William quipped after his dive, “I knew I had it in the bag when I heard the safety divers give me a grouper call, and I thought it seemed so early to see them.”

Successfully completing a dive of that magnitude was no small feat given the pressure placed on William as both the organizer of the annual event, and a highly publicized World Record attempt in the same week. “I like having William as competition” said Molchanov “it’s good because we push each other further. Even though I did not make my deepest CNF attempt it’s all good because I now know what I need to work on in terms of technique.”

Rounding out the leader board for the men was Samo Jeranko of Slovenia who had an excellent overall performance and captured several national records, including a constant weight dive to 107 meters, “I did not get narcosis at depth because I stayed focused.” Jeranko said as a matter of fact.

Taking first place for the women was Marianna “Masha” Krupnitskaya of Russia, and as I predicted Sayuri “the sleeper” Kinoshita of Japan came in a very strong second remarkably at her first international competition. Kate Middleton of FreediveGili and GiliYoga placed a very respectable third on top of the myriad national records she set.

Now all the athletes and the hard working safety & production crew head to an evening of celebrating, and some may even be starting to think about what’s in store for #VB2015 .